Most of them fail in that whole gender equality thing …

If 2016 is the year of dying rock stars, it's also the year of female DJs and producers.

Now more than ever, lady electronic artists are enjoying parity under the limelight. Just last weekend, Seattle threw their first-ever TUF Fest, an entire festival devoted to female, female-identified, non-binary and trans electronic musicians. Even larger, more storied festivals like Electric Forest and Shambhala are making an effort to even out the gender playing field with woman-only campsites and sub-fests like HerForest or Women's Safe Space, which feature a new frontier of all-female programming. Meanwhile, collectives like Brooklyn's Discwoman and Germany's Female:Pressure are making waves by showcasing the music of cis, trans and gender-queer female DJs in clubs all over the planet.

Yet while the dance world is making strides towards gender equality and a greater female presence in the festival circuit, it's still got a lot of work to do.

In 2015, Forbes' top-earning DJ list was entirely male; same with Billboard's "3rd Annual Power List of DJs and Execs." DJ Mag's 25-year anniversary issue was a sausage fest, including negatory women in its list of celebrated electronic artists, despite the fact that women have been making dance music since the first synthesizer bleep-blooped over fifty years ago. Even Boiler Room, who's featured plenty of female artists in their programming, came under fire last month after a performance by Swedish collective Staycore and producer Nightwave were received with a grossly disspointing slew of sexist, racist, transphobic and shaming slurs in their comments section.

These aren't isolated events. Instead, they're a symptom of an industry that is, in many ways, rigged against female performers. You don't have to look much farther than the lineup at your favorite festival as proof of that.

Good thing the people at Thump recognized this. They've created a short list of the 24 most female-friendly and female-unfriendly EDM festivals from all over the globe. Using the male-to-female ratio of performer's in a festivals lineup, they were able to name a few festivals that are a little farther ahead in the whole female artists acceptance thing than others.

CTM, Igloofest, RMBA NYC, Mutek Montreal, and Lightning In a Bottle were the most female friendly, while Beyond Wonderland, Ultra, Time Warp, EDC NY and Crssd were the least.

Weirdly, Electric Forest was only the lower end of the gender equality audit, yet they made headlines this year for installing the aforementioned female-only campground and something called HerForest, which was a set of programming that catered exclusively to female attendants.

Clearly then, Thump's gender equality metrics don't tell the full story of how EDM festivals are dealing with gender bias. However, the ratio of male to female performers in any given festivals lineup is a good indication of how much a festival considers diversity in their programming.

Interestingly, festivals with more EDM-focused programming like (Beyond Wonderland, EDC, and Ultra), as well as festivals specializing in big-room house and techno (Time Warp and Movement) strongly leaned towards lower female-to-male ratios. On the other hand, festivals accommodating a more niche, experimental-minded audience (CTM, RBMA NYC, and Mutek Montreal) typically included more women in their lineup. Take that with a grain of salt, though—those trends aren't universal. For example, FORM Arcosanti has probably the smallest, most niche, most experimental audience of all 24 of these festivals, yet their line up was over 75 percent male.

Yet, while it was a bit disappointing to see just how low of a female-to-male ratio some festivals had, Thump pointed out an important silver lining in the results: "Of all our findings, one was the most encouraging: Mysteryland, Mutek Montreal, Movement, EDC, and Ultra—all festivals we surveyed two years ago—had a higher percentage of female-identified artists in 2016 than they did in 2014, with Mutek boasting the most impressive increase, from 9.6% to 28.9%."

That said, a harsh reality remains: none of the festivals reached equity. Translation? Things are improving, but we've still got a ways to go.

It's not just EDM that suffers from gender inequality in the festival world, though. Even festivals with much more sonically diverse programming like FYF, Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, Glastonbury and Austin Psych Fest are dominated by male and male-identifying performers. Does this make any of these festivals bad, per se? Not necessarily. Does it make any of them inherently sexist? Again, not necessarily (although festivals would have achieved parity by now if sexist beliefs were entirely absent).

Women can and do have amazing experiences at male-dominated festivals where there are very few inspiring females to idolize and enjoy. Yet, as we push towards greater gender equality in 'Merica and beyond, having more diverse and more representative festival lineups can only help men and women of this country move beyond preconceived gender roles and beliefs that any gender is better, or more worthy of certain things than others.